Medication that is to be administered to a patient intravenously as a solution is conventionally packaged separately from the solution. That is, the medication is packaged in a drug vial, while a diluent, such as a 5% dextrose solution, in which the medication is to be eventually dissolved, is stored in a flexible container. Vial and container are individually sealed.
The diluent container has an inlet port sealed with a pierceable diaphragm, and the drug vial is sealed with a pierceable stopper. When a pharmacist receives a request for a particular medication that is to be intravenously administered, he selects the vial containing the required drug and a diluent container and interconnects the two by means of a connector which is provided with diametrically oppositely-extending hollow spikes for penetrating the stoppers in the vial and the container. Although the pierceable stoppers of the drug vial and of the container are penetrated by the above assembly, it is desirable to keep their contents separate until just before the medication is to be administered to the patient, since, once the medication is dissolved in the diluent, the solution's lifetime is very limited. Once the assembly reaches the patient's bedside and has been checked to be appropriate, the diluent is partially expelled from its container into the drug vial, mixed with the drug, drawn back from the vial into the container, shaken so as to uniformly distribute the drug in the diluent, and administered from the container to the patient through an outlet port in the container called the "administration port."
In order to ensure that the drug remains separated from the diluent until it is desired to mix the two, means must be provided to prevent the diluent from entering the drug vial through the interconnected hollow spikes. U.S. Pat. No. 4,675,020, issued to Charles J. McPhee and assigned to the present assignee, discloses one such means: a diluent spike scored near its sealed tip so that the tip may be broken off just before the diluent is forced into the drug vial through the now-open end of the diluent spike. While the foregoing expedient is effective, it requires some dexterity to use, and the presence of the broken-off diluent spike tip in the diluent container may be undesirable.